ON THE METAPHARMACOLOGY OF PSYCHOTROPIC DRUGS

Summary We have proposed psychoanalytic metapsychology as a useful explanatory tool for investigation of drug effects upon the psychic apparatus. All six metapsychological points of view: (1) genetic; (2) dynamic; (3) topographic; (4) structural; (5) economic; (6) adaptive, were brought to bear upon the psychic events in connection with drug use. Psychopharmacology can be seen as composed of two major divisions: A. Pharmacology —site, mode of action, etc.; and B. Metapharmacology —the application of the above six metapsychological points of view to the phenomenology and interpretation of drug response. This approach provides an overlapping frame of reference for psychopharmacology and psychoanalytic psychiatry, and permits the psychoanalytic psychiatrist to use his skills in an integrated approach to treatment.